Tag Archives | Perversion

If you’re looking to get a little outside of the ordinary with your next film choice, then definitely check out Quid Pro Quo.

Isaac Knott (Nick Stahl) is a Public Radio reporter in New York City. When he was eight, his mother and father died in an automobile accident that left him in a wheelchair.

On air, Isaac recounts how he recently received an anonymous tip from someone identified only as “Ancient Chinese Girl.” She tells him a perfectly able-bodied man walked into an emergency ward downtown, and attempted to bribe a doctor into amputating his leg.

As Isaac investigates the eerie tip, he encounters Fiona (Vera Farmiga) who, through her own quandary, leads Isaac to a netherworld of people afflicted with a perverse desire to be disabled. Like a contemporary noir detective film, Quid Pro Quo follows Isaac as he embarks on a dream-like journey to pull back the layers of what makes people feel whole.

This quixotic entanglement between reality and its reinterpretation through desire is the heart and soul of Quid Pro Quo. Isaac is drawn to Fiona’s dark side because somewhere in the strata of her perversion lies an underlying truth about himself. He is confined to a wheelchair because of an accident. What can he possibly learn about himself from Fiona’s desire to be like him? The answer of course is everything.